In this section, I break down the top three fantasy hockey performers every night and cite why I chose them in particular. In addition, I will track the amount of times the players have received this honor and tally them at the end of the season. For the sake of clarity, I will be using Yahoo! standard categories (Forwards – G,A,+/-, PP, PIM, SOG; Goalies – W, GAA, SV%, SHO) and thus exclude player’s salaries.

Busy night with 10 games and 20 teams in action. A few young stars took the spotlight tonight as we witnessed pretty balanced scoring. I cannot vouch for myself watching these games as I was too busy watching Team USA win in the WJHC! In other news, our betting expert Anthony Curatolo went an impressive 8-2. Here are our standout fantasy stars for January 5, 2009:

THIRD STAR: Tomas Fleischmann, Washington Capitals (0-0-1) – Fleishmann played center tonight, for the first time since his junior days, to great results. In over 15 minutes of ice time the 26-year-old scored a powerplay goal and assisted on two more leading the Caps to a 4-2 victory over the Canadiens. He also took three shots on goal while posting a perfect plus two making him a solid contributor across five categories.

Earlier this afternoon, Toronto Maple Leafs GM Brian Burke discussed numerous topics on Leafs Lunch – Leafs Nation Edition with Dennis Bayak. With the Leafs playing much better than their winless start, they may make some noise during the trade deadline or as Burke alluded to before it.

Personally I have always admired Burke’s honesty in discussing his teams. He usually gives his fans a perspective on what he plans to do while playing his cards close to the chest. The GM of the 2010 Team USA program also announced he will release the roster on Monday, December 28th.

Lets break down some of the topics discussed.

On the State of the Team

Thinks the playoffs are realistic and notes the team work ethic has been great to date.

Reemphasized not winning their first seven games really hurt their chances of climbing the standings.

Would like to see both goalies healthy and in rhythm. Wants two weeks with both Jonas Gustavsson and Vesa Toskala healthy so he can assess the situation and rely on one of them down the stretch.

Well maybe our headline is taking it a bit too far, but you can’t get a better player for your money. Claimed off waivers last year from the Predators the 27-year-old now has 59 points in 58 games for the Thrashers. The undrafted free agent recently signed a 2 year contract worth a total of 2.6 million a modest raise from his current 487,500 cap hit.

Since he makes 487,500 this year, as a technicality we can put his stats over his salary to determine his cost-per-point production. Prior to joining Nashville, Pevs was a point-per-game player in the AHL showing glimpses of his potential. If the graduate from St. Lawrence University continues his pace, he may be one of the greatest bargains of all time.

He averages a goal for every 61K he makes, a small value in comparison to Dany Heatley’s 441K per goal. The center assists on a goal for every 33K paid, making Joe Thornton’s 300K per assist look like a king’s ransom. Peverley’s 22K per point is 15K less than the next player James Neal, who is coming off an entry level contract himself. Nobody can compare to his proverbial bang for the buck.